Broken
by letthesongtakeflight
Summary: What happens when two broken people bond over insomnia, nightmares, and alcohol.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: **I obviously own nothing recognizable.

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Ten minutes past two on a Thursday night, a month after the battle of New York, and Natasha couldn't sleep. Lately, her unconscious hours were filled with Loki, with literally drowning in the blood of those she's killed. But she won't admit that to anyone; even Clint, as much as she trusted him, wouldn't be able to understand the darkness in her. His hands were bloodstained too, but not as much as hers. Nowhere near as much as hers.

That was why she found herself leaving her room in Stark Tower and taking the elevator to the bar at the top floor, where Stark's booze supply was always well stocked. To her surprise, the billionaire himself was sitting at the island, a glass of liquor in hand. She wordlessly plopped herself down on a barstool on the opposite side of the island; just as silently, he offered her a generously filled glass, which she drained. He refilled it.

"What're you doing up?" Despite the half empty bottle sitting on the island, testament to how much he'd drunk already, his words were not slurred, and the chocolate brown eyes regarding her were clearly sober.

She considered lying or deflecting the question with a snarky comment. She didn't usually have qualms about it; after all, she was a spy, and a good one at that. Lies and deflection were the bread and butter of her trade, and on several occasions her life had depended on her ability to lie. But she wanted to be as honest as she can with the Avengers, especially to Tony. She knew that he didn't trust her; hadn't trusted her since her deception as Natalie Rushman two years ago. After being thrown into a team together, his distrust had lessened, but it was a safe bet that out of all the Avengers, she was the one he trusted the least.

Maybe it was because she wanted that to change, or because of the surreal feeling from the late hour, or simply because she was mentally exhausted, but she didn't want to lie anymore. So she said, "Couldn't sleep."

"So you decided to raid my booze?"

"More or less." She shrugged. "Problem?"

A half-hearted smile grew on his face, a shadow of his usual cocky smirk. This was a Tony Stark weary of keeping up appearances. "No, but I'm not carrying you back to your room if you pass out."

"Fair enough, but I'm not dragging you back to your room either," she replied. "I'll leave you here for the rest of the team to find you in the morning."

The smirk widened, more closely resembling his usual grin now. "You underestimate me, Romanoff. Do you actually think that I'm going down before you?"

She gestured at the bottle, which was almost empty by now. "You had a head start."

The corners of his lips fell and he fixed her in an intense stare. "Let's see about that," he challenged.

Two hours and half a dozen drinks later, a tipsy Tony and Natasha were still sitting at the island. Tony was recounting how he and James Rhodes tried sneaking into the girls' dorm when they were at boarding school together. Natasha was listening with her head propped up with one hand, elbow on the table.

"And right when Rhodey was stuck in the window, those girls came up behind him and –" Before dissolving in laughter, Tony managed to gasp, "He fell down from the second-floor with his pants still down!" Tony was all but rolling on the floor, and it appeared inevitable from the way he was perched precariously on the stool. The story wasn't all that funny, but Tony's boisterousness, coupled with the alcohol, made Natasha relaxed enough – drunk enough she reminded herself – to allow herself to laugh.

Miraculously, Tony did not fall off the stool, but recovered enough to prompt Natasha. "Your turn, Tzarina."

"'Tzarina'?" She cocked an eyebrow incredulously. "Are you serious?"

He grinned, dark eyes gleaming playfully. "Weren't you a Russian princess?"

"Don't make assumptions, it just makes you look stupid." Her warning was more teasing than serious.

"But were you a princess?" Tony seemed genuinely interested.

Natasha paused, debating how much she was comfortable with telling him. "Who or what I was doesn't matter. I'm Natasha Romanoff now."

Tony nodded in understanding. She wanted to create a new identity, be someone who isn't tied defined by her past. He'd been there, he knew that feeling better than most people realized.

"Fury didn't approve of me choosing an alias so similar to my birth name," Natasha continued. "But I did it anyway. I don't want to completely disengage myself with the person I used to be. It's not someone I'm proud of being, obviously, but at the same time..." She trailed off, the words for explanation failing to come to her.

"You don't want to forget how your past has made you into who you are now," Tony finished for her.

"Exactly."

"But if Fury didn't like your new name, why did you stick with it?" he pressed. "I thought you lived for orders."

A spark of defiance rose in Natasha' gaze. "I don't question them; that doesn't mean I can't make decisions for myself. I don't think Fury has a say over something as personal as my name."

"Does it ever bother you, though?" Tony said. "That you have to listen to Fury? Not question orders?"

She considered this for a moment. "A little," she admitted at last. "But sometimes the alternative is worse."

He leaned forward, elbows resting on the surface, brown eyes intense despite the copious amount of alcohol already in his system. "If you, or Hawkboy, or any other agent, had confronted Fury about what was really going on with the Tesseract, everything might have turned out differently. No Loki, no battle, none of that crap."

"Maybe," she said. "You think of that a lot?"

"Yeah, you know I have a thing with orders." The seriousness disappeared from his eyes and he leaned back, taking a long drink from his glass.

"No, about the battle, Loki, all that," she amended, genuinely wanting to know.

"Yeah," he said frankly. "Don't you?"

She looked away, reluctant to admit weakness but even more unwilling to lie to Tony. "Yeah," she whispered. She met his eyes briefly before looking away again, unable to let him see the weakness in them. Sincerity had torn down all her walls, and she knew that he recognised the vulnerability in her. The same look was in his eyes – unguarded, vulnerable – and she knew that he understood completely because he felt it too.

"Good to know you don't live and breathe for Fury's orders. Remind me to call you next time I hack into SHIELD." Tony grinned and the mood lightened immediately, the vulnerability dissipating. He got up and stumbled to the elevator, leaving Natasha to finish her drink. Watching the elevator doors close upon him, Natasha had a feeling that sleep would come easier and more peacefully tonight.

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**Author's note: **There need to be more fanfics of this ship. This fic was meant to be a one-shot but it kind of grew and now it's a giant. I hope you guys are happy with reading a lot more of these two.

Please review and let me know how I can improve. I love these characters so much and I hope they're not too out of character.


	2. Chapter 2

The nightmares struck mostly when Pepper was out of town, because Tony slept better when someone was next to him. But even then, there were times when Pepper's warm presence wasn't enough to quell the nightmares. Incoherent mixtures of Afghanistan, New York, Vanko, Loki. The Avengers missing, Rhodey tortured, Pepper killed. One terrifying image followed by another.

His ingenious solution, as with so many other problems, was to get drunk. Sometimes Natasha would already be at the bar when he went there in the middle of the night, sometimes she would join him. Despite never acknowledging it to the other, they both knew that the other's dreams were as troubled as their own. It was written in the lines of their drawn faces, dark circles under their eyes, a flash of an unguarded, haunted expression that briefly appeared before features were schooled into nonchalance or arrogance.

Excepting that, they were honest with each other. Somehow it was easier to take let their guard down in the dead of the night under the muted lights of the bar, when it seemed that they were the only creatures left in the world. Tony learned early on that Natasha would retreat immediately into her shell when he brushed on sensitive topics. He, too, used sarcasm and snark to evade talking about things he didn't want to.

So he stayed in the safe waters. It was an utter relief to open up to someone who didn't only listen, but also understood. He liked to think that he was the same to Natasha – someone she could talk to, someone she could trust, someone she to whom she could expose her insecurities. He knew that she was close with Barton, closer than Tony himself could ever be to her, but given that the archer was about as open with his emotions as Natasha, she probably didn't pour her heart and soul out to him. Tony liked that he was the only one who had seen the infamous Black Widow with her walls down and masks removed.

Tonight, though, he could sense that something was different. Natasha was perched on her usual seat, glaring at the amber liquid in the glass in front of her. This was not out of the ordinary, but there was an aura of – something, he wasn't sure what – that was different.

He eased himself into the seat opposite her. Her eyes darted to his briefly, but she didn't say anything. He debated internally whether he should ignore the unspoken taboo of nightmares – rules were for breaking, after all. But he didn't want to press too much and fracture the fragile relationship they had. So he stayed silent, waiting for her to talk if she wanted to, or to silently drink into oblivion with her if that was what she needed.

Natasha seemed the prefer the latter, at least until three glasses later, when she growled, "Dammit Stark, don't you have something stronger than this?"

"Please tell me that was rhetorical; don't you know me at all?" He took out a bottle of vodka. "This good enough?"

"Perfect."

"Very Russian of you." As he poured their drinks, he couldn't help adding, "Tzarina."

Ignoring the comment, Natasha downed her shot and gestured for another.

"Not a bartender," Tony muttered, though he obliged. At the redhead's continued silence, he quieted and returned to his own drink.

"Bad one?" Natasha asked softly. Pepper was in town; usually Tony wouldn't turn to alcohol to drown out the nightmares.

Tony was mildly surprised that she chose to breach the topic, but he merely shrugged in reply. "Pepper kicked me out of the room. I woke her after I –" he broke off, offering his attention to the glass in front of him.

"You had a nightmare." Natasha finished for him in the same quiet voice.

Tony nodded, still avoiding Natasha's piercing eyes. It was good to get that out in the open, even though he knew that she knew anyway. "So did you."

She made an affirmative noise, waiting for him to continue.

"Wanna talk about it?" He could feel himself crossing some invisible border, plummeting down in a free fall in the dark. They never talked about something so personal, let alone something that made them vulnerable. They both hated appearing weak. He wondered how she would react to his suggestion. She might talk about it, or she could retreat so deep into herself that he could never coax her out again. Inexplicably, the notion that he will never see this side of the assassin again awoke some sad, remorseful feeling in him.

Fortunately, she chose the former. "How about we swap?" Natasha raised her gaze to his over the top of her glass. "You first."

"Fine." He agreed lightly, hiding his relief and also his trepidation at voicing his deepest fears. "It doesn't make much sense. Have you ever noticed that when you try to remember a dream, it never does?"

"Yeah. Like a piece is missing."

"Exactly," Tony says. "Anyway, I started remembering it right in the middle of a battle. I think it was New York, I mean it was in New York, and we were fighting the Chitauri, but I'm not sure if it was the battle couple of months ago? So yeah, I was holding off this entire army, and I was –" His head sank into his hands, sucking in air through his teeth. He let out in a shaky breath. "I've never felt so overwhelmed before. They were coming from all around me, practically materializing out of the air. Then it was like I'm watching from the outside, looking at them surround me. And then I saw – it wasn't me in the middle of the army, it was Pepper, and I tried to get in to her, to get her out of there, but I was falling, through the portal and I tried flying, but I couldn't fly faster than the fall..." Tony slapped his palms against his forehead in frustration, a sound akin to a sob wrenching from his throat as his breathing turns into gasping.

"Tony. Tony." Natasha tok his hands to stop him from hitting himself. She rarely sought physical contact that wasn't of a violent nature, and she knew next to nothing about comfort. But it was tearing her up to see Tony in such a desperate state. She cared about him, as a teammate, as a friend, even. She cupped his face in her hands and forced him to look at her. "Breathe, Tony."

He nodded, taking deep breaths through his mouth. Slowly, his shaking subsided and his hysteria faded. "That's it," she said soothingly. "It was a nightmare. The battle's over. You made it out of the portal in time. You blew up the Chitauri. That's what's real. Hold on to that, not the nightmares, not the... non-real memories."

Tony forced himself to meet Natasha's gaze. Quietly, he said, "Was that what you did after they brainwashed you?"

It's almost as if he pushed a big red button. One moment her face was a breath away from him, her serene and composed air calming him. The next she was on the other side of the island, standing to her full height, flaring up with anger. For a second, Tony believed that she was about to pull out a gun and shoot him. "How did you know that?" the Black Widow snarled, "Have you been in my file?"

"Chill, I'm the only one who's read it. No one else can hack into SHIELD." Despite his shock, Tony couldn't resist bragging.

Natasha calmed, but only by a fraction. She sat back down on her stool. "Talk, Stark," she said harshly. "How and why."

Tony decided that despite all his self-hatred, he was rather attached to life and wasn't in a hurry to die, especially not because of some dumb, impulsive question. So, he answered in seriousness. "I like to know who I work with. SHIELD gave me some intel on each Avenger, but no details. Steve, Bruce, Thor... there's info on why they're an Avenger, who they were before, how they became a 'superhero'," Tony put air quotes around the word, "Even Arrow Man had a couple of sentences on him. You – nothing on your past. So I hacked into SHIELD, looked up your file."

Natasha nodded once, her face settling into impassive coldness once again. Tony wished that she would crack that surface a little – figuratively speaking of course – and let him see what was inside her. He once told her that he couldn't get a read on her. Back then she was under cover, but even now when he knew her – her real identity, what she did, even who she was before she became Natasha Romanoff – he still couldn't read her like he read other women. She was an enigma.

"How much do you know?" Natasha's voice was cold. This was an interrogation.

"As much as SHIELD does," he answered. "They don't have much detail, though. Well, there's no shortage of info on your missions; how much time do you put into your reports?" He digressed. "Anyway, they've tracked your career from KGB onwards. But before that, there's hardly anything. A basic outline. Like I said, no details."

Natasha nodded imperceptibly, almost to herself. A flash of emotion – perhaps relief? – flashed across her face before Tony could recognise it and then she put up that blank wall again. "Good," she said, a little less severely.

Tony gave her a half-smile that lacked his trademark confidence, but was warm and sincere. She did not return the gesture, but her expression softened as she returns to her drink. They lapsed into silence for several minutes before Tony spoke. "So, are we still on for the deal? I tell you mine, you tell me yours?" He was prepared for her to say no, especially after he his intrusion upon the privacy she was so fiercely protective of.

"Might as well," Natasha said grudgingly; she may not have been enthusiastic, but she agreed and Tony took that as a positive sign. "This dream is one I've had again and again, and every time I get hit the same way," she began, her voice steady and devoid of emotion. "It was in the Red Room, when I was still being trained, I thought myself to be in love with one of my trainers." She scoffed with disdain at her former foolishness. "I was young – a teenager – and I had not yet learned that love always ends up hurting you. He knew what I felt, used that to his advantage. The dream always ends in the same way – me finding out about his betrayal and confronting him, and he tells me that he never – that he had been using me all along. But tonight, he turned into Loki." Her voice wavered and Tony recognised that the dam inside her was straining from holding back her emotions, but she kept going. "And he says to me what he said in the helicarrier, about the red in my ledger, about lying and killing for my existence, about killing me and Clint –" she broke off abruptly, her breathing becoming uneven as she fought to rein in her emotions.

"Hey, it's okay." Tony put an arm across her shoulders, pulling her close, and they both leaned across the island. Natasha's hands were fisted into Tony's shirt. He had his arms cradling her, one hand rubbing comforting circles. Their roles were reversed now; it was Tony comforting a hyperventilating Natasha, when not so long ago she was there for his panic attack.

They stayed in that position for a long time; it wasn't comfortable, they were both half out of their seats to reach each other across the island, but neither one moved from the strange embrace. Natasha calmed down quicker than Tony did; he wondered how many times she had woken from a nightmare with only herself for comfort. He suspected that the number was far too high.

When she was calm and her breathing even, he murmured against her hair, "Your nightmare is a memory, isn't it?" She was silent; Tony wondered whether he should interpret it as a wordless confirmation.

"Those are the worst kind," she finally said. "Because you don't know whether it is real or not."

"Even if it is, it's in the past," he said. "It doesn't define who you are now."

Natasha released him from their awkward tangle and returned to her own seat. The island was suddenly too wide, an intrusive barrier between them. "Maybe it does," she said quietly. "I don't try to pretend that the past didn't happen, that I'm not affected by what I have done." She looked straight at Tony, and once again he had the feeling that she was staring into his soul. "You know what I mean?"

This was the man who was once dubbed the Merchant of Death. There was as much blood on his hands as Natasha's, maybe even more. He understood what it was like to struggle to stay afloat in an ocean of blood. He knew the toll that had on one's conscience. "Yeah," he answered softly. His eyes met hers. No emotionless facades, no sarcastic airs. Without the walls that constantly surround them, they may as well have been completely naked. An unspoken infinity of understanding passes between them.

Natasha was the first to move. She broke eye contact, turning back to her drink and draining the remainder of it in a single gulp. "We should go back to bed."

"You have a bed to go back to, I get the couch." Tony deadpanned.

Natasha gave him a genuine half-smile that brought warmth to her usually cold eyes. She stood up, and before going back to her room, she said lightly, "Enjoy."

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**Author's note:**

I can't believe that this story is read and liked by a surprising number of people. Iron Widow shippers, where have you been all my life?! You guys are the reason I'm continuing this story. Well, you guys and the fact that Tony and Natasha give me feels. Way too many feels. Shout out to Inner Cinema on AO3.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing recognisable.

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"What's wrong?" Natasha asked as she entered, because something was obviously wrong. Tony was slumped at the bar, elbows on the island, head between his hands, and the way his hair stuck up in angles was evidence that he's been tearing his hands through it. A glass and a half-empty bottle of scotch were on the island. A nightmare, no matter how realistic or horrifying, could not possibly account for the utter defeat and hopelessness.

"Pepper left."

Natasha did not say "I'm so sorry"; she knew that they were meaningless and useless, and apologising, especially for something she had no control over, was not something she did. She sat down on the stool next to him. "Did you expect it?" Because if he didn't then he was a lot more oblivious than she gave him credit for.

Tony hesitated before nodding grudgingly. "We've been fighting, a lot, about everything." She knew this; for all the privacy of separate floors, they lived in the same tower and besides, noticing these things were second nature to her.

She poured them both drinks; he downed his in one go and she drank hers too, albeit with less enthusiasm. She refilled their glasses. "Is there anything you can do to fix it?"

He shook his head and sighed. "I tried everything. Buying her stuff, taking her places, letting her make decisions – I even blew up all my suits for her." It came out as a choked sob. There was something unsettling about seeing Tony Stark so broken and defeated, and something deep inside her, what fragments were left of her humanity, ached to soothe him.

"Was that was it was all about? You blew them up for Pepper?" she murmured. When he came back from Malibu a few months ago with no suits, the team had been surprised, but he had been prickly about the subject. Natasha had seen a slightly forlorn look in his eyes when he talked about them; she knew how much they meant to him, how much a part of him they were. They were, in his own words, a "high-tech prosthetic", and to destroy them was akin to giving up some bodily function, to become crippled and immobile. For a man who valued his privacy and freedom so much, this was the greatest sacrifice.

"I wanted to show her that she meant more than them. That she was the most important thing in – " He rubbed the heels of his hands hard against his eyes and Natasha knew that he was fighting the urge to cry.

She remembered what it feels like to be utterly broken, to have the purpose of your life taken away in the blink of an eye. She's had some not-so-strong moments, dealt with overpowering emotions, and she knew that they have to be dealt with rather than allowed to fester. "Let it out. I won't judge," she encouraged.

Her words seemed to release him, for he began to sob his heart out. She instinctively wrapped her arms around him and held him tight. Jaded as she was, she knew that there was some unexplainable comfort in a hug, in a mere human touch. She did not offer empty reassurances, but told him silently that she will be there for him when he needed her.

"Why did she leave, Tash?" Tony said in between sobs. "Why is everything I do not good enough?"

"It's not your fault," she said firmly. "You did all that you could to salvage the relationship, and no one could have done more in your place."

He pulled back from her embrace, much calmer now. "Then why?" The raw pain was evident in the quiver of his voice and the shine of tears in his eyes.

She smiled wryly. "I know next to nothing about love, Tony. But what I do know is that relationships are messy. You have to give and you have to take. It's compromises and sacrifices and appreciation – and if even one of you can't accept that, then it's gonna fall apart."

"For someone who doesn't know much about love, you give good relationship advice." The look he gave her was more like his old self, though still sad and a long way from alright.

She gave a low laugh. "It's just from experience. At least it explains why my past relationships never worked out."

He fixed her in a knowing stare. "Are you the giver or the taker?"

"I guess that we – me and my exes – were all takers. We're selfish and short-sighted, we wouldn't weather it out when things turned sour."

"And what about me?" He leaned closer, and so did she when she answered, "Giver, as much as you pretend to be a selfish jerk."

He grinned, and she smiled, glad to see him looking more like the Tony she knew – part arrogant playboy and part vulnerable soul.

He caught her by surprise when his mouth crashed onto hers. It was desperate and needy and she found herself kissing him back. She didn't stop to think, only aware that the thought of Pepper wasn't nagging at the back of her mind like a guilty conscience. Tony planted messy kisses along her jaw, travelled down to suck at her neck, and she had no control over the low moan that he elicited from her.

But they were both aware that it's not love. It was comfort, pure and physical, and this was the only way that they knew to satisfy such an intense need. Natasha was all too willing to give what Tony so needed, and maybe she needed what he had to offer too, more than she had previously realised. It had been too long since she sought physical release, and with Tony it was somehow physical and emotional all at once.

They managed to make it to Tony's floor of the tower before stripping the clothes off each other. It was not a slow or romantic or thoughtful affair, but a mad, frenzied one. They ended up tumbling onto the couch, taking each other as though the world would end if they did not. And when they were both sated, they fell asleep, naked bodies tangling on the too-small surface, finally at peace from the nightmares of wakefulness and sleep.

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**Author's note: **There are people actually reading this? Welp. Drop me a review, I love to hear from you :]


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer:** As usual, I own nothing but the Iron Man bobble-head on my shelf.

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They tried to act like it didn't happen, that they never slept together. They tried to return to their old, comfortable habit of meeting at the bar on the top floor of the tower for drinks and late night talks. But one night, after a particularly bad nightmare, Natasha kissed Tony and the request in that was clear enough that he took her to his room.

After that, they ended up in his bed, or at least his floor, more often that not.

They sometimes fell asleep together, but there was never any cuddling or sweet whispers. They were both too independent, too stubborn, to admit their need for emotional comfort and attachment.

Natasha always woke first, and she would dress quietly, go back to her room and carry on with her day. Most of the time Tony would still be asleep, and on the few occasions that he's awake, he would pretend to be asleep, and would never stop her from leaving.

This became part of their ritual, an established pattern. Despite his break up with Pepper, Tony did not resort to his old womanizing habits, nor did Natasha go to strangers for sexual release. They would go to each other, and they would satisfy each other. It was simple. Clean. No strings attached.

There was a tacit agreement that it will always be like this. In front of the other Avengers or SHIELD agents, they were friends, close friends even. But they never gave a hint that there was more to their relationship than that. It was for pure, physical need and comfort, and it always works better when it's with someone with whom you can let your guard down.

But this constancy was shattered when Natasha's past was released for the world to know. She returned from DC in the wake of the collapse of SHIELD and the exposed gory of her past.

The tower was empty, save for Tony. The rest of the Avrngers were all scattered around the globe, weathering out SHIELD's collapse: Bruce was in Africa, Thor was in Asgard, Steve was God-knows-where looking for the Winter Soldier, and Clint was staying in Greece where he had been on a mission.

Natasha was on her floor of the tower — and she considered the tower "home" despite living there for only a couple of months — when Jarvis said, "Ms Romanoff, Mr Stark would like to invite you for a drink with him tonight."

She was surprised by the formality of the invitation. Tony Stark didn't invite girls to places, he told them where to meet him and they were all too willing to come, even when they knew that he would use them and dump them. To invite her this way, giving her the choice to reply or even decline, was significant in some way she could not yet recognize. "Alright, let him know I'll be there at midnight." It was earlier than their usual time, but she reckoned it would be easier than stumbling out of bed at three in the morning.

When she arrived at the top floor of the tower at midnight, Tony was already there. He gestured for her to take a seat at the bar, where he mixed a drink for her before taking the stool next to hers, and she asked, "What's this?"

"I've been experimenting since everyone left. This is one of the milder ones, I don't want us to get drunk just yet." His tone was light, but she sensed a deeper meaning behind it.

"Have you named them?" she asked, referring to the drinks.

He shook his head. "No, I wanted to name one badasstini, but... nah."

She smirked. "Good call. That sounds like something I should definitely avoid."

"There's one that's called the Widow's Bite."

"Ouch." She wondered whether she is its namesake, but refrained herself from asking. It would be presumptuous, she told herself.

He tried to smile, but it didn't touch his eyes. Natasha looked away and took an experimental sip. It's good, sweeter than what she's used to and somewhat fruity, and the alcohol, unmistakable on her taste buds, was just strong enough to leave a slightly bitter aftertaste.

Silence fell, broken only by the sound of their breathing, the occasional clink of the glass on the table, and the minute sounds Tony made when he fidgeted in his seat. The air was charged, though with what Natasha didn't know, and she was slightly worried that their moment will be ruined.

"How are you, Tash?" Tony asked softly.

She met his gaze and her walls came falling down. The thoughts she had kept voiceless and hidden now tumbled out. "Not as great as I'd like to be. My cover's blown, the world knows who I am now. Who I was, what I've done, all those dark secrets I tried so hard to bury are exposed and they will never be forgotten. When I joined SHIELD all those years ago, it was to start off on a blank slate, do good to outweigh the bad I've done. But now SHIELD's gone, and I'm back at square one – no job, no purpose, and a ledger dripping with blood. And to know that the cause I've served all these years is not as worthy as I thought, that it's as dirty as the masters I escaped from – that brings all the progress I've made crashing down."

"No, it hasn't," he said. "You once told me that you don't follow orders without question. What you have done is just that – you follow orders, but you think them through, and you go rogue when you need to. You didn't do what SHIELD ordered you to, you did what was right, and that's why you've come so far from the person you were."

"Do you really think that I can be more than how SHIELD saw me? More than how the world, now, sees me?" _Can you wipe out that much red?_

"Yes." The single word was filled with conviction. She gave him a small, sad smile. She wished she could share his optimism.

After another long silence, Natasha said, "You remember how I told you once that I don't do whatever Fury tells me to?"

"Yeah." He smiled. "First time we did this." He gestured at the drinks on the table.

"Yeah." She found herself smiling a little forlornly. "Well, I guess that a part of me is relieved that I don't have to take orders anymore, not from Fury, not from anyone. I've spent so much of my life following orders, doing other people's dirty work; I've never lived without waiting for my phone to ring and an order to fly me off to the middle of nowhere for some mission. It's actually daunting that there isn't a next mission, that this is it, that SHIELD doesn't have any control over me anymore." She let out a nervous little laugh.

"So what are you gonna do now?" Tony asked.

"I'm flying out in a couple of days. I'll be in Eastern Europe, hiding out for a while like Clint is until this whole thing blows over. I'll get a new identity, make a new cover. Maybe I'll freelance again?" She smiled, bittersweet.

"Will you come back?" It sounded almost like a plea, and despite her rational judgement, her heart tugged traitorously.

"I don't know. When I'm needed."

"You could stay," he blurted out. She looked at him in naked surprise.

"Why?" Her voice was a whisper, and she fought to suppress the hope that swelled in her chest and lit up her eyes.

There was no pretense in his open and vulnerable expression as he said, "I need you."

She closed her eyes to suppress the pricking behind them, and to conceal the longing that she knew must be naked in her gaze. Tony Stark begging her to stay was breaking what's left of her heart, but she couldn't do this to him – couldn't drag him into this mess she's in, muddy his name by hers, destroy the progress he's made through association with her. She was a pragmatist, a survivor. She's always done what she must do to survive, even if it meant breaking her own heart and his in the process. She should walk away from this and start afresh.

But maybe Tony could be her fresh start. She's never planned on leaving forever, not when she knew that she will eventually be needed and she will come back to save the world. So maybe, they could do good together, help each other, because he was the only one she's connected with like this, the only one who understood that struggle for penance. And she was the only one who really understood him, the obsession, the nightmares, the guilt, because she's been there before, and in a way still was there.

They had both spent too long hiding behind masks, covering their vulnerabilities up with cockiness and nonchalance; cold-heartedness and indifference. Maybe it was time to remove them and step into the light. And maybe, they could do it together.

So when she said, "I need you too," her meaning was transparent, the vulnerability obvious, and without asking, he knew.

Tony curled his fingers below Natasha's jaw and angled her face to kiss her. It was as unlike their previous rough, artless kisses as possible; it was soft and loving and tender, as though they were afraid of breaking the fragile agreement between them, as though they could not bear to be anything but careful. This kiss – gentle, unfamiliar, but pleasant – seemed to herald a new beginning.

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**Author's note: **Innercinema, you are inspirational.


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: **I obviously don't own anything.

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In the weeks following the beginning of their relationship, Natasha and Tony had the tower to themselves, with the rest of the Avengers still scattered across the globe. They took advantage of the privacy to accustom to their new closeness. Natasha was pleasantly surprised when she found out how tactile Tony was; he would put his arm around her or take her hand or simply lean against her whenever they were occupying the same space. For someone so unused to physical contact, she found it endearing and comforting, and became more assertive in physically touching him, often curling up against him on the couch.

Tony discovered that Natasha sang in Russian when she thought no one was listening. He loved how her smoky tones carried the foreign syllables, and after he told her so, she became less shy about it and would sing even when he was listening.

Natasha found that she liked wearing Tony's worn, stretched t-shirts, and he found that she looked better in them than in anything else.

Occasionally, Tony surprised Natasha in bed with breakfast, but more often than not she would be up hours before him, and when he woke she would already be showering after a session at the gym, and if that's the case he joined her. But more and more frequently, she would lie in bed after waking, sometimes waking Tony too, others daydreaming until he woke.

Gradually, Natasha's belongings migrated into Tony's floor. It began with essentials like her toothbrush, then her iPod and fat books of Russian literature. Tony found that the space in his closet was reorganised – or rather, _became_ organised, as it hadn't been organised to start with – to make space for her clothes. She'd claimed one side of the bed as her own, her territory marked by the phone charger permanently plugged into the nearest socket and a book on the bedside table.

It had been two weeks since their relationship began, and this sheer domesticity was something that both of them had once found unbearable. But now, in the face of the chaos of SHIELD's collapse and the inevitable, if not imminent, return of their teammates, it seemed like a holiday.

One evening when Natasha walked into the living room, Tony was sitting with his back to her. She was about to call his name when she heard a voice that was definitely not his or Jarvis's. Her senses were on full alert at once. She angled herself to peer into the room without being seen, and found that it was empty. Tony replied, and taking a few steps into the room, she saw the tablet in his hands and Bruce's pixelated face on the screen.

"Hey," she said, coming up from behind Tony and touching his shoulder.

He looked up at her in surprise. "Oh, hey Tash" he said, and Bruce waved at her from the screen.

"Hey Bruce, what's up?" she said, sitting down next to Tony, deliberately avoiding physical contact with him. Tony shot her a look, which she ignored.

"Tony was telling me what happened with SHIELD," Bruce replied, oblivious to the couple's behaviour. "I guess I don't have anyone keeping tabs on me anymore, right?"

"_I'm_ keeping tabs on you." Tony pointed out. Natasha and Bruce laughed, and she had to fight the urge to lean in to him.

"Strangely, I'm okay with that," Bruce said. "Do you guys need me to come back to New York? See how things are going and deal with whatever you need me to?"

"Probably not a great idea," Natasha said. "We're all celebrities now, so it's best to stay off grid for a while, until this whole thing dies down."

"Or until you need me to smash things up again, right?" The doctor joked with a self-deprecating smile.

"Or that." Tony grinned. "Keep those muscles fit, big guy."

"Hopefully we won't need you to do that anytime soon." Natasha added.

Bruce laughed, then asked in seriousness, "Natasha, if staying away is the best move, why haven't _you_ left yet?"

She froze; she sensed Tony stiffen next to her. "I..." Her eyes flickered from Bruce's face to Tony's. His expression was tense, the lines around his mouth hard and he resolutely kept his gaze away from her. On one hand she wanted to tell Bruce; she knew how hard it was for Tony to not let his friend know. But she couldn't so blatantly ignore her instinct for self-preservation when this information could so easily mean hurting herself or Tony, not even when she rationally knew that Bruce would never use that against them.

She answered, "I guess I've been persuaded that the world will fall if I'm not around."

"Uh huh..." Bruce said, confused. "Anyways, I'm going to be here for a while, so..."

"We'll keep in touch, buddy," Tony said before hanging up. He set the tablet down on the coffee table and when he turned to face Natasha, his expression was serious. "Look, I know we haven't talked about whether we want them to know about us –"

"Are you mad that I didn't tell Bruce?" Natasha snapped, immediately defensive. "I know you've always had your entire life laid out in front of the public, but I haven't, and –"

"Bruce isn't the public." He interrupted forcefully. "He's our _friend_."

"I know! What I mean is that it's so difficult for me to tell people about my private life, because more often that not it's come back to bite me in the ass and in that moment I just let my instincts take over and not tell him, because now it's not only my life I'm risking but yours too." She stopped her rant in agitation, discomfited that she had showed so much of herself in an outburst.

Tony's expression softened. "I know you don't think so, but I get it. I've lived my life in public, yes, but I do try to protect those I love from that, especially now when it could mean putting them – putting you – in danger."

"Thank you." She sighed. "And about telling the team – just give me a little while to get used to this, to us, before we tell them. I promise that we will, eventually, just not right now."

He nodded and, taking her hand, kissed it. "Okay. We'll tell them when you're ready, and not a moment before that."

She smiled forlornly. "I'm sorry I'm such a mess."

"Hush," he told her, pulling her into a tight hug.

She wrapped her arms around him and said, "So we're good?" to which he replied, "Yeah." In that moment, she knew that staying was a risk worth taking.

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**Sorry for not updating sooner. I actually updated this work on AO3 ages ago but forgot about FFN... my apologies for that. I've been super busy because life is a bitch, and also I got caught up in writing another IronWidow fanfic with the amazing InnerCinema on AO3. It's a teenaged Avengers AU, it's like Avengers meets The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo meets Robin Hood. That's gonna be kinda a long term project though :P**

**Don't worry, Broken is still underway, I just need a while to figure out where to go with this. I'll try my best to update within December, and if not then definitely within January.**

**Love you all so much. Especially those who left reviews and gave suggestions. Thank you all so much for letting me know that there are so many IronWidow shippers out there ;]**


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